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V. H. 85 G. T. URISMAN'.

FLUME RAGK CLEANER.

No. 332,790. Patented Dec. 22, 1885.

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WITNESSES:

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PATENT OFF CE.

VIRGIL H. ORISMAN AND GEORGE T. GRISMAN, OF BRANGHVILLE, N. J.

FLUME-RACK CLEANER.

SPECIFICATION forming part of Letters Patent No. 332,790, dated December22, 1885. Application filed March 2,1885. Serial No. 157,581. No mmlellTo all whom, it may concern:

Be it known that we, VIRGIL H. GRIsMAN and GEORGE T. CRISMAN, bothcitizens of the United States, and residents of Branchville, Sussexcounty, New Jersey, have jointly invented an Improved Flume-RackGleaner, of which the following is a specification.

Flumes which lead the water to mill-wheels, and especially to thevarious kinds of turbine wheels, are provided with racks at or near thepoint where the penstock is connected with the flume for the purpose ofstopping and collecting floating leaves and other bodies, which wouldotherwise pass on into the wheel and perhaps clog or injure it. If afloating stick of tough wood should get into the rapidlyrevolvingturbine wheel, it would inevitably The rack placed in the flume stopsall such floating matter, but the matter collects on the rack, and atsome seasons of the year, in autumn, especially, it will accumulate in ashort time in amount sufficient to nearly stop the flow of water. It isnecessary to keep'the rack free from this accumulation, and it isordinarily effected by hand with the aid of rakes The object of ourinvention is to provide a continuously operating rack cleaner to bedriven by power, and provided with a comb or rake thatis drawn over theface of the inclined rack at regular intervals, from bottom to top, andthe accumulated floating matter dumped outside of the flume.

Our invention will be fully described hereinafter, and its novelfeatures carefully defined in the claims.

In the drawings which serve to illustrate our invention, Figure 1 is alongitudinal ver tical section of our improved apparatus, taken in theplane of the longitudinal axis of the flume. The plane of the section isindicated byline l 1 in Fig.2. Fig. 2is a rear end elevation of ourapparatus,the flume being in section in the plane indicated by the line2 2 in Fig. 1.

Let A represent a part of an ordinary flume, open at the top, and B apart of the penstook, which leads the water from the flume to thewater-wheel. G is the rack, which is usually set inclined at about theangle seen in Fig. 1. This rack is usually made of metal bars properlyspaced and secured together by rods.

The particular construction of the rack and its angle of inclination arenot material to our invention. We have shown the rack as commonlyconstructed and arranged.

Our apparatus or device comprises as its essentials two shafts, D D,mounted in suit able bearings, sprocket-wheels E E, mounted two on eachshaft, as shown, two endless chains,

F F, mounted on the sprocket-wheels, and a p rake or comb, G, secured tothe endless chains.

This rake is in the form of a toothed bar,which' extends across fromchain to chain. On the upper one of the shafts D is fixed a drivingsheave or pulley, H, and over this passes a Wire rope or driving-belt,I, whereby the pulley H is driven from the mill. The apparatus may,however, be driven from any convenient source. The lower'or workingsides of the chains F are arranged substantially parallel with theinclined rack, and move upward, as

indicated by the arrow. The position of the rake G just as it isstarting on its upward movementis indicated by dotted lines at m in'Fig. 1. Its, teeth enter between the bars of the rack, near the bottomof the flume, and as it is drawn upward it gathers the accumula tion ofleaves, &c., from the rack. As soon as it clears the upper end of therack, it is caused to discharge its load by a stripper, J This strippermay be merely an iron bar bent back at the-ends to form pivoting-arms aa, which are pivoted at b to brackets c on the flume, or to some otherpart.

The rake G is shown by the full lines in the drawings to have justengaged the stripper J,- and in the dotted lines at y in Fig. 1 the rakeis shown as just clearing the stripper after the latter has finished itswork. The relative movements of the rake and stripper are such that theyrecede from each other, and thestripper is thus caused to draw off therubbish from the rake and allow it to fall outside of the flume. Thestripper then falls back to its place by force of gravity. We usuallyarrange one a'rm of the stripper to play in a slot in a plate, d, tolimit its movement; but this we do not think essential.

WVe usually mount the shafts I) D in a stout wooden frame, K, one end ofwhich rests on the bottom of the flume, and provide this frame with legs6 e, which rest upon the rack.

The weight of the apparatus will usually be sufiicient to keep it inplace while in operation without the necessity of fastenings of anykind, and this construction renders it easy to raise the apparatus upoutof the water during freezing weather, at which time it will be leastneeded, as the water is then freed from leaves, 320.

One or more rakes G may be used; but one will suffice, even though thechains run slowly, as the accumulation of leaves is usually quite slowrelatively. As the rake and chains must be arranged in front of therackthat is, on the upstream side-we prefer to use but twochains,arranged near the sides of the flume, and but one or two rakes.Otherwise the chains, and rakes would form an obstacle to the flow ofthe debris to the rack.

In endlesschain cleaners for sewers and drains numerous endless chainsplaced so close together as to form a seive-like apron, and providedwith rows of teeth at every joint, have been proposed. These are veryexpensive, and serve as racks to collect the debris, as well ascleaners. These of course run in the opposite direction from our device,anda comb is used as a stripper. This we do not claim.

It will be seen that our bar-like rake, supported at its ends on the twochains which stand close to the sides of the flume, provides aconstruction that will not offer any appreciable obstacle to the flow ofthe debris to the rack where it is collected.

Other equivalent forms of strippers might be employed with ourapparatus, and we do not limit ourselves to that shown. The kind ofstripper we show, however, is inexpensive, and enables the apparatus todo its work more thoroughly.

Means may be employed to tighten up the endless chains, if desired, andsliding boxes with adjustingscrews for the bearings of the upper shaftwould serve. These are so well known as to require no description.

The ordinary coarse or open rack now employed at the head of the flumewill prevent large and heavy floating bodies from getting into the flumedown to our cleaning device or apparatus. This we have not deemed itnecessary to show.

Our apparatus may be readily applied to any ordinary flume and rack, andthe shafts D may be mounted in or on the flume itself or in a separateframe, as shown. As the speed with which the shafts revolve, and theuniformity of the speed are not very essential, the apparatus might bedriven by a small wind-wheel, and this might be of advantage where theapparatus is situated at a considerable distance from the mill, or atmuch higher level than the mill. For the drivinggear H any of thewell-known forms of driving-gear may be substituted-as toothed gears,for example, or a crank.

We do not broadly claim a mechanism for removing dbris from flumes andraces composed of endless chains with teeth; nor do we claim, broadly,the employment, in connection with such a machine,of a device forstripping the debris from the teethas such have been proposed before.

Having thus described our invention, we claim- 1. A flume-rack cleanercomprising aframe to support the moving parts, the sprocketwheels andtheir shafts, mounted in said frame, the two endless chains arranged atthe sides of the flume, so as to leave a free passage between them forthe floating debris, the barlike rake extending across from chain tochain and secured at its ends to the chains, and a stripper arranged tostrip the debris from the rake, all constructed and arranged to operatesubstantially as set forth.

2. A flume rack cleaner comprising the frame K, with legs e e to rest onthe rack,the sprocket-wheels and their shafts, the two endless chainsarranged near the sides of the flume, the rake mounted on said endlesschains, and the stripper, constructed and arranged to operatesubstantially as described, whereby the said cleaner may be set on therack in proper relation therewith, and be readily removed from theflume, for the reasons set forth.

3. The combination, with the inclined rack of a flume, of the hingedstripper arranged to operate as shown, and a rack-cleaner comprising thesprocket-wheels and their drivinggear, the endless chains on saidsprocketwheels, and the rake secured to said chains, the chains beingmounted in the frame, sub stantially as set forth, with their underworking sides substantially parallel with the rack, and the hingedstripper arranged with respect to the chains substantially as set forth.

4. The combination, with the rack O of a flume and the hinged stripperI, of the removable rack-cleaner comprising the frame K, with legs 6 eto set on the rack, the shafts and their sprocket-wheels, mountedin'said frame, the two endless chains F F, arranged near the sides ofthe flume, and the rake G, 1

mounted on the chains, substantially as set forth.

In witness whereof we have hereunto signed our names in the presence oftwo subscribing witnesses.

VIRGIL H. oRIsMAN- GEORGE r. CRISMAN.

Witnesses:

HENRY HUSTON, CHAS. M. WOODRUFF.

ICC

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